Yesterday we discussed the following topics:
See below for descriptions and further info and links.
Well folks I am very pleased to report that our initial meetup at Veteran Hall went quite well and I think that most attendees enjoyed and learned good stuff. For those of you that attended, I sincerely thank you for your donations as they covered the hall hire cost with some extra for my time spent.
The early part of the meetup was spent covering the 3 main radios in our devices - that is WiFi, Bluetooth, and mobile data - and how to easily switch them off and on. We also discussed how these radios can be used to track us. We spent some time focusing on location services and looked at settings in both iPhone and android phones to limit the device and certain apps from providing location tracking upstream to big tech platforms. I think we'll probably see some more questions on this topic and I will happily continue these discussions.
You can download a PDF file of the presentation I showed the various settings to change in android and iPhone from here . See page 4.
We also discussed two factor authentication (aka 2FA) and an open source app called FreeOTP+. This is a free open source app that replaces the need to use the Google or Microsoft Authenticator apps that only runs on android. I have been using this one for many years now on my android phone and it works a treat. There is another app with almost the same name (FreeOTP) which is available for both android and iPhone, but it has a flaw in the backup / restore so I do not recommend it for iPhone at this time. We'll look into other alternatives for iPhone.
Update: Happening Saturday 9th November from 10am at Veteran Hall. Kitchen available - please bring your refreshments of choice.
For those of you wanting to improve the privacy of your phones, tablets, laptops, and computers, and get away from using big tech’s expensive software, I would like to invite you to attend the inaugural "Digital Privacy and Free Open Source Software" user group meetup.
As a group we will decide which topics to pursue at each meeting based on our objectives.
The group will explore the following topics:-
Read more: Gympie Digital Privacy User Group - Inaugural Meetup
Here are the user group events, presentations, and workshops I have planned to help improve the privacy of your digital devices.
Announcement! The inaugural meetup of the Gympie Digital Privacy User Group will happen on Saturday 9th October. See the announcement here.
In this 20 to 30 minute presentation, I explore the ways that big tech tracks and spies on you. You will find out what measures can be taken to protect your privacy on both your mobile phone/tablet and your computer/laptop.
This presentation is available for groups wanting to learn the basics and is also used as the introductory part of the following workshop.
Join me for an hour workshop that will empower you and your family by improving the privacy of your digital devices.
You will come away from the workshop knowing that your current mobile device will be as private as possible. And you will have an understanding of what other things you can do to further protect your devices and on-line activities.
Discover open source privacy friendly apps that can be used with your existing devices and replace big tech standard offerings.
Alternatives for
Bring your phone and laptop and learn how to wipe the phone and install a privacy friendly operating system.
Advanced version available for those wanting to de-google other people’s phones.
Learn what Linux is and what it can do and how to pick a distribution to suit you. Find out how easy it is to use. And also learn what applications replace commonly used Windows apps.
Also learn what computing equipment can run Linux, how to install it, where to get additional applications, and how does it get updates and upgrades.
This workshop will explore the various tasks and options involved in migrating from your Windows computer to the Linux distribution of your choice.